Maccoby returns to the sources of Christianity to show how Judas was invented by successive gospel writers, thereby ingraining in the minds of Christian Europeans a perverted image of the Jew as a malevolent betrayer. He goes on to show how this idea helped to justify 2,000 years of genocidal persecution.

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In this fascinating historical and cultural biography, Peter Stanford deconstructs that most vilified of Bible characters: Judas Iscariot, who famously betrayed Jesus with a kiss. Beginning with the gospel accounts, Stanford explores two thousand years of cultural and theological history to investigate how the very name Judas came to be synonymous with betrayal and, ultimately, human evil. But as Stanford points out, there has long been a counter–current of thought that suggests that Judas might in fact have been victim of a terrible injustice: central to Jesus' mission was his death and resurrection, and for there to have been a death, there had to be a betrayal. This thankless role fell to Judas; should we in fact be grateful to him for his role in the divine drama of salvation? "You'll have to decide," as Bob Dylan sang in the sixties, "Whether Judas Iscariot had God on his side." An essential but doomed character in the Passion narrative, and thus the entire story of Christianity, Judas and the betrayal he symbolizes continue to play out in much larger cultural histories, speaking to our deepest fears about friendship, betrayal, and the problem of evil.

This fascinating books sifts the evidence and startlingly concludes that in the earliest sources Judas was not a traitor. While the name Judas Iscariot evokes horror among many people, Klassen argues persuasively that Judas may have meant no harm in handing over Jesus to the religious authorities. The book traces the ways in which Judas is portrayed by the four writers of the gospels, showing how the picture was increasingly demonized as the later gospels were written. This is the most important study in English of Judas within the context of first-century Judaism. Klassen shows by rich reference to literature of both the ancient period and later times how the concept of Judas as traitor emerged.

In this bold, captivating and controversial book, the author combines his own intensely moving personal accounts with incisive scriptural analysis, and challenges the reader to reassess what they think they know about Judas Iscariot and suicide. Drawing on the memory of his own brother's action in taking his own life, Aaron Saari examines Judas Iscariot as the definitive figure of God's abhorrence for suicide and a powerful symbol of the cultural taboo originating from Christian doctrine. Instead, he argues, this ancient condemnation of Judas' death is unfounded: Judas is instead a literary invention of the Markan community meant to undercut the authority of the Twelve, entering the Christian story c.70 CE through the Gospel of Mark. Written with passion and clarity and consistently relevant to today's moral issues, this book is as much an ideal introduction to biblical studies for the general reader as it is essential reading for students, scholars, and anyone with an interest in Biblical studies, ancient scripture and theology.

As the insider become outsider, Judas demarcates Christian boundaries, defines insider identity, and locates evil. Three Versions of Judas explores the mythic work transpiring in the Judases of the gospels and of subsequent scholarly and artistic interpretation form the perspective of Jorge Luis Borges' "Three Versions of Judas." In that short, Borges' protagonist, a modern Gnostic, finds the canonical story of Judas incredible and, therefore, creates seriatim three alternative versions: (1) a Judas who is the necessary, human complement to Christ's redemptive work, (2) a Judas who denies himself the spirit for God's greater glory, and, finally. (3) a Judas who is himself the incamate One. Three Versions of Judas finds three similar Judases in the gospels and in their interpretation. The gospels, too, offer a Judas who is necessary to the Christian myth, a Judas who is the determined outsider, and a Judas who is demonic. In more Borgesian terms, the gospels offer a Judas who is victim of an infinite book, who is Jesus' necessary rival and Christian scapegoat, and who is the precursor of the alienated modern individual. The concentration on the mythic work evident in these Judases in Three Versions of Judas leads to ethical reflections nicely summarized by the last lines in Borges' short story: "he [Borges' protagonist] added to the concept of the son, which seemed exhausted, the complexities of calamity and evil." Specifically, Three Versions of Judas considers the evil necessarily inherent in Christian story-telling about Judas, or, more broadly, in self-identification at the expense of the other. Borges' stories provide a fortuitous vantage point for this project because his fiction is fantastic. Instead of constructing and supporting "reality", as myth does, fantasy provokes metaphysical hesitation. Borges' fiction does so by abutting other well-known stories and by multiple transgressions of narrative levels. Consequently, it becomes difficult to construct reality confidently, and all metaphysics and religions become branches of fantasy, stories told alongside an ineffable reality. Therein, myth becomes ficciones and Judas becomes Judases.

Judas: Images of the Lost Discipletraces the development of the stories about the most famous traitor in the history of Western Civilization. Its purpose is not to find the Judas of history, but rather to provide readers with a map that shows the similarities and connections between generations of Judas's story. Judas has been portrayed as an effete intellectual, a jealous lover, a greedy scoundrel, a misguided patriot, a doomed hero, a man destroyed by despair, or God's special, misunderstood messenger and agent. Judas means as many different things to us as does Jesus or God. The enigma of Judas's story in the Gospels left later literature and legend with a creative challenge they richly answered, and which is presented here: to write the real story of the worst villain of all time.